write a history, he supplied the one with short annals of all Roman affairs, from which he could select at pleasure; and the other, with rules on the art of composition. I am, therefore, surprised that Asinius Pollio should have supposed that he was in the habit of collecting old words and figures of speech for Sallust, when he must have known that his own advice was, that none but well known, and common and appropriate expressions should be made use of; and that, above all things, the obscurity of the style of Sallust, and his bold freedom in translations, should be
XI. VALERIUS CATO was, as some have informed us, the freedman of one Bursenus, a native of Gaul. He himself tells us, in his little work called “Indignatio,” that he was born free, and being left an orphan, was exposed to be easily stripped of his patrimony during the licence of Sylla’s administrations. He had a great number of distinguished pupils, and was highly esteemed as a preceptor suited to those who had a poetical turn, as appears from these short lines:
Cato grammaticus, Latina Siren,
Qui solus legit ac facit poetas.
> Cato, the Latin Siren, grammar taught and verse,
> To form the poet skilled, and poetry rehearse.Besides his Treatise on Grammar, he composed some poems, (515) of which, his Lydia and Diana are most admired. Ticida mentions his “Lydia.”
Lydia, doctorum maxima cura liber.
> “Lydia,” a work to men of learning dear.Cinna 873
thus notices the “Diana.”